The great Sufi mystic Rumi once said, "If you are seeking, seek us with joy, for we live in the kingdom of joy. Do not give your heart to anything else but to the love of those who are clear joy, do not stray into the neighborhood of despair. For there are hopes: they are real, they exist -- do not go in the direction of darkness -- I tell you: SUNS EXIST!!!" The mystical utterances of Rumi and other great Sufi Masters speak directly to the heart. They encourage us to see the hidden Light, to discover Divine Secrets, to perceive the Way that lovers can find their Beloved. The Sufis, through their poems and ecstatic revelations are attempting to share their Secrets with the world, or at least with those discerning souls who find their words to be not only nice poetry, but something much more -- soul-expressions coming from lovers caught up in the divine bliss of a higher reality.

The "Door" or "Window" to God is the Third Eye Center

"Listen, open a window to God and begin to delight yourself by gazing upon Him through the opening." (Rumi)

The poet-mystics speak of a spiritual reality that exists just beyond the perception of the five senses. Though the physical body is a kind of "veil" that eclipses the Light of the inner Sun from our vision, nevertheless we can, even now during this life, have access to this other existence. The Persian classic, "Divine Flashes," by Fakhruddin 'Iraqi says:

"The lover seeks the Vision in order that he might pass away from existence; he knocks on the Door of Nonexistence, for there he was once at peace. There he was both seer and seen, both viewer and viewed. Coming to be, he became the veil of his own sight and was deprived of the Vision. His existence is merely a screen to hide this sight."

In order for humans to "knock on the Door of Nonexistence" (regain the spiritual Vision we once enjoyed as souls before time began) 'Iraqi encourages us to understand ourselves in a new way and begin to contemplate the Other World with another kind of sight, a type of seeing that is unveiled when we temporarily abstain from the five senses.

"Know yourselves: a cloud drifting before your Sun. Cut yourselves off from your senses and behold your Sun of Intimacy."

'Iraqi is describing here the process of meditation practiced in numerous mystical traditions of the east and west. In order to obtain the Vision, the seeker 1) closes their eyes and stops paying attention to the outer world for awhile, and 2) discovers inner spiritual seeing and hearing, the inner senses of the soul which are able to contemplate heavenly realities.